Sixth Mirror for Giant Magellan Telescope in Chile now in Production
- May 6, 2021
As part of the production of the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT), researchers at The University of Texas at Austin will fabricate the sixth of seven of the world’s largest monolithic mirrors. These mirrors will allow astronomers to see farther into the universe with more detail than any other optical telescope, producing images 10 times sharper than the Hubble Space Telescope.
With the first two giant mirrors completed and in storage in Tucson, Arizona, the sixth mirror joins three others in various stages of production at The University of Arizona’s Richard F. Caris Mirror Lab. In the next 10 years, the giant mirrors will be transported thousands of miles to the GMT’s future home at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. The southern hemisphere location gives GMT access to the center of the Milky Way and its supermassive black hole — as well as many of the most interesting nearby galaxies.
The GMT project is the work of a distinguished international consortium of leading universities and science institutions.
Read the full story from the McDonald Observatory.
